


Is This What You Want

by h_smythe



Category: 13 Reasons Why (TV)
Genre: Clony - Freeform, First Time Blow Jobs, Friendship/Love, Gay, Love Confessions, M/M, Public Blow Jobs, Public Sex, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-30 20:09:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19410502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/h_smythe/pseuds/h_smythe
Summary: 8 months after Hannah's death, Tony invites Clay to come with him to a dance at the community center in Tony's neighborhood. Partway through the night, Tony notices that Clay is gone, and finds him sitting by himself outside, looking out over the beach. The two have a confrontation.





	Is This What You Want

The tension left Tony’s shoulders as soon as his eyes finally landed on Clay, who was around the back of the farthest corner of the building and sitting on a low concrete wall that edged the small garden that must have been planted by some community group. Past the wall the beach started, and as Tony approached the sound of the waves in the dark got louder. Clay had his back to the community centre and was looking out into the dark where the ocean must be. The music was muffled and distant from here, and the party lights occasionally swerved and flashed through one of the high windows in the hall. 

Tony continued toward Clay without pausing, a low hum of anxiety beneath his skin. He recognized this posture of Clay’s, the way that he had his hands shoved into his pockets and his back rigid, his head facing straight forward. This time though, he wasn’t sure what was behind it; in the past, this body language had always been somehow centred around Hannah, and around everything that came out afterward. Eight months had passed now since all of that happened, since the tapes, and Tony had been there watching as these moments had softened for Clay. Tony had seen him work through the grief, had supported him as he began, slowly, to come to terms with the wrongs that had been done, and the work that it would take to move forward.

A jarring thought suddenly surfaced—was it the dance? Was that what was triggering it? His mind flashed back to that other dance, over a year ago now, the one where he had watched from his place behind the sound equipment on the stage as Hannah and Clay had moved across the dance floor toward each other. He remembered the bittersweet sinking feeling in his chest as he had watched Clay’s face, and as he pulled out that next tape and clicked it into place, he had swallowed his feeling of—what was it? loss? jealousy? but how can you lose something that hasn’t ever been anywhere close to yours?—and forced himself to watch as they came together, knowing that he had helped this along with this song. The sweetness of it, the pure beauty of how Clay looked at her. Tony had wanted that for Clay even while he had clenched his teeth against the useless hurt of it. And later, when he had given Clay that tape, it was because he had known what that moment was for Clay. How he had lived inside that moment again and again, wishing it back, after Hannah’s death. Tony knew how to read the expression of wishing for what you could never have; it was one that he had learned to swallow and keep only for himself, after years of practice.

How had Tony been so stupid, not to recognize what it would feel like for Clay to be at another party like that, music playing, people enjoying themselves—and the missing girl still missing. It seemed so obvious all of a sudden, and he felt a sinking inside him, that old swell of pain and shame in realizing that he had let someone he cared about down. He felt betrayed by himself, because how had he not caught this? Lately it had gotten harder, it seemed, to think clearly when it came to Clay. The guilt of that: he had let his desire to spend time with Clay become more important than Clay’s own wellbeing. He had forgotten to think it through, to consider what this kind of celebration might bring up. Tony swallowed hard and tried to put away his own guilt, his own uncertainties, as he closed the distance to the low wall and leaned his knees gently against it, standing a few feet to the left of Clay, who didn’t turn when he arrived. 

“Hey,” Tony said, casually, gently. He glanced sideways at Clay’s profile, the tense set of his friend’s jaw bringing guarded concern into his own features.

“Hey.” The word was hard and brief. Clay’s blue eyes stayed trained straight forward.

A few beats of silence went by. A wave crashed a little harder against the shore. Tony continued to watch Clay’s face, breathing through the guilt that was tightening its hold on his chest. “You alright?” he asked, his voice tentative, light.

Clay raised his eyebrows, and a look of irritated disbelief crossed his features, but still he did not look at Tony. He took a breath and looked down at his knees, licked his lips. Finally, he said, “I just needed some air.” And then, an edge that Tony couldn’t read entering his voice, he added, “It was getting pretty hot in there.”

Tony turned his gaze out toward the night, blinking, his internal confusion fogging up his thoughts. He had always found Clay so easy to understand, even when he was shutting down; normally Clay’s silences and cryptic comments were almost laughably transparent to Tony, as though there was some easy translation that Tony knew intuitively how to do to make sense of Clay’s signals. It had made it so easy to be there for Clay and to support him in the ways that he needed when he was at his most fragile. Tony had usually known what Clay was asking for before Clay even seemed to know himself. Right now, though, Tony felt lost. What was Clay trying to tell him, with this disappearing act, this sarcasm? 

He cleared his throat, glanced down at the concrete wall and scuffed his foot against the dirt. “For a minute there I, uh, thought that maybe you’d taken off or something.”

Right away, Clay shot back, finally turning his head and looking at his friend, “How could I have left, Tony? You’re my ride, remember? What would I do, hitch hike?”

“Okay,” Tony replied, feeling knocked off-centre by the venom in Clay’s voice. “I was worried, that’s all.”

Clay made a sound in his throat that almost sounded like he was trying to laugh as he turned his face back toward the darkness. Tony watched him carefully, feeling deeply unsure, and beginning to feel a little annoyed. 

“What’s going on, Clay? Whatever it is, you can tell me. Or if you want me to leave you alone, I can do that too—but I just want to make sure that you’re okay.” As he spoke, he thought he saw a crack appear in Clay’s hard mask, a momentary tremor in his features, that vulnerability that shot straight through all of Tony’s defences immediately and shut out all thoughts other than the need to protect this boy in front of him. The desire to hold him, make him safe. Tony kept his arms at his sides, clenching his hands into fists to keep himself from reaching across the couple of feet between them: _This isn’t the moment_.

And in the next second he was very glad that he hadn’t, because the softness that he thought that he had seen was gone, and suddenly there was a strange, un-Clay-like expression on Clay’s face. He turned back toward Tony, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and a sort of arrogant smile plastered over his features. He said, “Marisa’s pretty sexy.” His eyes stayed on Tony’s face, that smile in place, as Tony doubled back in his mind and kept his body perfectly still. 

“Okay…” he said, furrowing his brow slightly and searching Clay’s face. He didn’t know whether to laugh or get angry. Why was Clay talking about Marisa? And then it dawned on him: maybe this had nothing to do with Hannah. Maybe Clay was into his cousin, and was just being an asshole about it. His thoughts suddenly landed on the moment during the song when Marisa had said playfully into his ear over the thumping bass, “Your friend’s watching us,” and against his better judgment he had felt his stomach drop, letting himself imagine for a moment what that might mean. Now he got it. A wall came slowly up inside of Tony, and he felt the familiar slide into casual detachment. “You want me to see if she wants your number or what?”

“Don’t you think that might be confusing for her, you asking her if she’s interested in another guy?” 

There it was again, that sarcastic tone. Despite himself, Tony felt his unease seep up through his nonchalance. “… Another guy?” 

“Oh, come on Tony, I saw the way you two were dancing together.”

“Clay you realize that you’re talking about my cousin, right? Who I grew up with?”

“Whatever you say, Tony.”

The anger that surged up caught Tony entirely off guard, and he didn’t have time to stop it. If Clay liked Marisa, fine—that was fine. Tony had been here before, he knew that Clay was very much into girls, he had come to terms with it over and over again. He thought that he was ready for it. But he wasn’t ready to be treated like shit because Clay was jealous that he had danced with his cousin, someone who he had been dancing with since childhood. This kind of bullshit was not something that he had to deal with.

“For the last fucking time, Clay: _I. am. gay_. You know this, I know this, Marisa knows this. She and I dance together because we _like_ to dance together. _That’s it_. She knows that I’m not there for anything else. If you're interested in her, you won’t have to fight me to get to her.”

“How can you say that, when everyone in that fucking room saw how you two were grinding on each other in there?” Clay stood and faced Tony, the low wall in between them. The muscles in his neck and jaw were tight, and his eyes were hard and cold. “But yeah, go ahead. Lie to me.”

Tony shook his head in disbelief, his eyes wide. He took a step back, away from Clay, their eyes still locked together, and then turned and walked a few more feet toward to community centre. His teeth ground together, and the absurdity of the situation overtook him, forcing choked laughter up his throat. Again, he shook his head. _Lie to you?_ he thought. _You’re damn right I’ve been lying_. He swung back around toward Clay, and some small part of him watched from inside, warning him to back off, to relax, not to take the bait. That more was at stake here than this stupid little argument. Cool off, walk away. But he couldn’t. It was too much.

“Fuck you, Clay,” he spat out, shocking himself with the intensity in his own voice. Clay blinked, faltered, but stayed where he was. “ _Fuck_ you. You have no idea how hard it is to feel the things that I feel. You have no _fucking clue_ what it’s like. And now you’re fucking jealous cause I was dancing with my own cousin? You’re pissed _at me_ , because Marisa was dancing with me and not you? And you’re grilling me about it like I’ve wronged you in some way, when I’ve spent years, _years_ , Clay, watching the way that you look at girls, the way you looked at Hannah, Sheri, and fucking _dying_ inside. But I never put that on you. Because you don’t deserve it, it’s not your fault. But you know what is your fault? You treating me like shit right now because you’ve got a hard-on for a girl who you’re convinced that I’m into. When I am _not_. I am fucking _not_.” When Tony finished he was shaking, his nostrils flared, his fists clenched. He drew in a few ragged breaths, the silence stretching between them. Finally, Clay’s mask was gone, and Tony saw the colour risen in his cheeks, the bafflement on his face. He stood there empty-handed and blinking.

“Dying inside…?” Clay murmured, his eyes searching the ground in front of him. Tony swallowed and he forced himself not to look away from Clay’s face. His expression stayed hard. “What… why would..? Why would it bother you, if I liked girls?” Clay lifted his gaze back up and the two boys’ eyes locked. The mystification in his voice would have been amusing under different circumstances. Instead, Tony just felt exasperated. He couldn’t stop himself from rolling his eyes. He also couldn’t stop the words shooting out of his mouth before he had time to edit, to switch gears, to laugh it off.

“Because _I’m in love with you_.” And then, as a halfhearted, muttered afterthought, “Idiota.” Tony sighed, rubbed his hand over his face.

The rush of the confession subsided as quickly as it had come, and Tony felt cold dread rising in his stomach. He made himself look at Clay’s face, which was frozen in a totally blank expression, as if he were in shock. What had Tony done? _Why did he do that_? Oh shit. “Oh shit,” he said out loud. The words felt dull and empty, but he said them again. “Oh shit.” He was suddenly lightheaded, all of his calm and all of his anger evaporated, leaving him feeling empty and shaky. He bowed his head and brought his palm up to his forehead.

“Tony.” Clay was still standing there, hadn’t moved, and when Tony forced himself to lift his eyes up he couldn’t read this new expression. Tony felt an unfamiliar panic rising inside of him—this wasn’t something that Tony did. Tony was not vulnerable like this. He shook his head, his eyes still wide, put his hand over his mouth. How could he undo this?

“Listen, Clay,” he forced out, his voice weak now. He could hear his own shaky desperation and he hated himself for it, but the words kept coming because he didn’t know what else to do. “I’m sorry. I won’t ever bring it up again. We can leave right now, I’ll drive you home, and then you’ll never have to see me again, I’ll never come near you again, you won’t need to touch me or talk to me or hear from me, ever, if that’s what you want. Okay? I promise.” He was having a harder time breathing now, hearing himself say these words and knowing that he would have to make them true. He couldn’t think too hard about that now or he would break down. And he could not break down here. He had to keep it together. In the silence that followed his stream of words he could not make himself look at Clay. He couldn’t lift his eyes. He waited for his best friend to tell him how much he disgusted him. Tony had been here before, with straight boys, a long time ago—when he was a kid, before he knew the way that it would go. He had learned the hard way how to avoid this exact situation. He would never let it happen again.

“How could you think that I would want that?” Clay’s voice was so quiet and soft that Tony barely heard it over the sound of the waves and the far-off beat from the dance hall. They were still standing on either side of the wall, a few feet away from each other. Tony heard, with confusion, the gentle shaking in Clay’s voice echoing his own. He made himself breathe. He stared at the ground and tried to make the dizziness ease off. His voice getting a little stronger now, Clay continued, “How could you think that I would want to never see you again? How could you know me so well and think that I would want that?”

Tony shook his head, still staring at the ground. His mind was so foggy and confused. He was not used to feeling this helpless. “…I’m sorry,” he said, because he didn’t know what else to say.

“Why are _you_ sorry? Jesus Christ, Tony, how can you be the one who’s sorry right now?” Clay was looking at him, his expression astonished, and, Tony noticed uncertainly, warm. He didn’t look angry. He did not look disgusted.

“I’m sorry because I shouldn’t put that on you, ever. I shouldn’t make you feel like you’ve _done_ something to me. I mean, shit, Clay… You haven’t done anything wrong.” Tony’s voice was hoarse.

“I was acting like a jerk,” Clay replied. “And it—“ Clay hesitated. “It wasn’t because I was jealous that you were dancing with Marisa. I wasn’t jealous, or, not of you. I honestly thought that maybe you liked her, and it pissed me off, because…” Clay looked at the ground and bit his bottom lip, then shrugged. “It pissed me off that you hadn’t told me, that you were keeping it from me. I’m sorry that I acted like an asshole.” He lifted his blue eyes back up and met Tony’s gaze.

Tony smiled weakly. “Yeah, you kind of did.”

Clay grinned. “I really did, yeah.” 

Their smiles faded into the silence between them as the two boys watched each other. 

“But listen, Clay—” Tony started, finally. He swallowed. “I meant what I said before, I _am_ sorry. I shouldn’t have thrown that at you. It’s not your responsibility, or your fault. And you don’t have to worry, I won’t bring it up again. It won’t affect anything, we can pretend like it never happened.”

“Well… maybe I don’t want that.” Clay’s expression was serious as he returned Tony’s stare. Tony studied his face and took in a long, slow breath before he responded, his voice low and earnest.

“What do you want, Clay?”

Tony watched as Clay broke eye contact, his gaze trailing down Tony’s face, down his body, and Tony felt the blood rise to the surface of his skin, hot, tingling. His thoughts went quiet and all of him stayed still, waiting.

Slowly, Clay took a step forward, over the cement wall, and then another, so that he and Tony were a couple of feet apart, face to face.

“What I want is to make sure that I don’t keep making the same mistakes,” Clay said, his voice a hoarse murmur.

“…What mistakes?” Tony asked.

“The ones I made with Hannah,” Clay said, and Tony flinched, ever so slightly, at the mention of her name, the muscles in his jaw tightening. He took a step back.

“Hey, Clay, you don’t have to worry about me. I’m not Hannah. This is nowhere near the same thing, I’m not going to leave here and hurt myself, okay? I’m fine. I’ve been fine, I’m going to keep being fine, so please, don’t feel like you need to save me. I can take care of myself.”

"No, that’s—” Clay sighed, frustrated, and shook his head. “That’s not what I mean. I’m not saying this right. I don’t mean, ‘like Hannah’ like you’re going to do something to hurt yourself. I mean—” He paused, glanced cautiously at Tony, who stared back with a searching, guarded expression. Clay tentatively stepped toward him again, closing the distance that Tony had put between them, and his voice lost its nervousness and became gentle. “‘Like Hannah’ like… there were so many times that I wanted to kiss her, so badly, Tony, but I didn’t. And I should have. I should have fucking kissed her, every time it crossed my mind to—I should have asked her if she wanted me to kiss her, that first time that I thought that maybe she did. But I didn’t, because I was afraid. And I told myself, after she died, I told myself that I wouldn’t let myself do that again. Be too afraid.”

Both of the boys’ breathing was audible in the quiet that followed. Tony made himself speak.

“What are you afraid of?”

Clay moved toward Tony again, so that this time their faces were less than a foot apart—so that when Tony inhaled he could smell Clay’s sweat, and his skin, that familiar, fresh, boyish scent.

“I’m afraid of not letting myself feel what I feel. Of not letting myself want what I want… I’m afraid of never being brave enough to do this,” Clay said. And then he leaned forward, hesitating for an instant and Tony could feel Clay’s breath on his lips just before the other boy’s mouth pressed against his, softly. Tony’s lips responded but the rest of him stayed perfectly still, waiting for this whole moment to dissolve somehow.

Clay pulled back, just enough to be able to look into Tony’s face, his eyes searching. “Do you want me to stop?”

Tony exhaled something halfway between a laugh and a sigh. “No,” he replied quietly. “No I don’t want you to stop. You have no idea how much I want you _not_ to stop.” Tony looked down at the ground and then back up at his friend, whose face was so close to his, and made himself ask the thing that might undo all of this: “But Clay… Are you sure that this is what you want?”

“If you fucking ask me that question one more time I’m going to lose it,” Clay laughed, and in one motion his hands were up on either side of Tony’s face and his mouth was against Tony’s again, pressing harder this time, his lips moving against Tony’s insistently, searchingly. Finally Tony’s uncertainty couldn’t hold him back anymore, and he was pressing back against Clay, their bodies pushing into one another, Tony’s hands gripping Clay’s waist, his back, his fingers finding their way into Clay’s hair, and inside Tony’s head, over and over again, the word _finally_ , _finally_.

Everything Tony had wanted, years of waiting while knowing that he would never get what he was waiting for rose up to the surface in Tony and took him over. And Clay’s lips were opening, Tony inadvertently letting out a gentle groan as he felt Clay’s tongue move against his lower lip and then into his mouth to meet Tony’s. Tony felt like he was going to lose it, he used his tongue to open Clay’s mouth wider and pushed in, vicious, hungry. An almost painful jolt ran through his body as he felt Clay’s hard-on pressing against his leg, and his hand found its way underneath Clay’s t-shirt to the warm skin of Clay’s back. Suddenly Clay broke the kiss and was pulling his own shirt off, and Tony couldn’t touch enough of him with his hands, he moved with kisses down Clay’s chest and stomach, dragging his lips along his friend’s pale skin. He lowered himself to his knees and as he kissed the place where the trail of hair just began on Clay’s lower belly, he could feel the trembling in Clay’s body. He began to unbutton Clay’s jeans.

“Tony,” Clay said, “You don’t have to… I mean, I’ve never…”

“Clay.” Tony looked up at him, his hands paused on the zipper of Clay’s jeans, fingers separated by only a layer of fabric from Clay’s obvious erection. “I won’t do anything you don’t want. But…” A mischievous light entered Tony’s murky green eyes, and he raised an eyebrow. “… Is this what you want?”

Clay laughed, and tilted his head back, shaking his head at Tony’s comedic timing. Then the nervousness came back into his face, and a blush rose in his cheeks. “I mean—of course, I _want_ it,” he said, awkwardly. “But I’ve never, you know, done this before.” He chewed on his lip. Tony’s insides melted at Clay’s intense vulnerability, his total shyness in this moment. Tony felt his own hard-on pulse inside the confines of his pants, as he contemplated what it would be like to break through that vulnerability. “And I don’t want you to feel like you need to or something, like I’m using you to get off, or… I don’t know. Like this is what you have to do, or something.”

Tony smiled. “Believe me, Clay, I’m not doing anything that I don’t want to be doing. And this is something that I’ve dreamed of doing for a very long time.”

With a thrill of satisfaction Tony watched the blush rise in Clay’s cheeks, the way Clay blinked his eyes and took a shaky breath as he looked down at Tony on his knees in front of him. The nervous tension in his bare shoulders relaxed ever so slightly as Clay asked, his voice tentative, “Really?”

“You fucking kidding me, Clay?” Tony asked, laughter in his voice at the guy’s ongoing, complete obliviousness. “ _Yes_ , really. Christ, thoughts of this keep me awake at night. Thinking about this has gotten me into trouble with other guys, ‘cause I find you so fucking distracting.”

Clay started to laugh, and Tony smiled back, internally disoriented by the ease with which he was suddenly sharing this kind of detail with his best friend. Things he had never expected to say out loud to anybody, least of all Clay. And now they were laughing together about it, and Tony was distractingly close to Clay’s body, to the hard-on that Tony could see move ever so slightly under the constricting material of Clay’s pants.

“… I got you in trouble?” Clay asked, grinning.

Smiling, looking up at him, Tony replied, “Yeah, you did. On more than one occasion.” The pleased look on Clay’s face sent a wave of warmth through Tony’s body, and he leaned his head forward and pressed his lips lingeringly against Clay’s lower waist, his hands sliding up the sides of Clay’s legs to hold onto his hips. Tony pulled back from the kiss and murmured, “And I’ve got a feeling you’re going to keep finding ways of getting me in trouble.” Again he kissed Clay’s skin, just above the line of his pants, his lips hot. He felt the rise and fall of Clay’s breathing quicken against his mouth. He loved the taste of Clay’s skin. Gently, he opened his mouth and his teeth bit ever so slightly, his tongue running briefly over Clay’s smooth skin. Now he could hear the breath catching in Clay’s throat.

“Tell me what you want, Clay,” he murmured, in between the slow, hot kisses. He moved from the ridge of one hip bone, one kiss at a time, toward the other hip bone.

“What I… want?” Clay’s voice was clouded, his eyes closed.

“Yeah, what you want.” Tony began a series of licks and bites, flicking his tongue over a stretch of skin before briefly settling his teeth into it, then moving on to the next spot.

“I want…” Clay’s dreamy response was interrupted as he gasped. “Jesus Christ, Tony, no one’s ever done anything like this to me before… That feels, it feels incredible…”

“I want to do whatever feels good for you, Clay,” Tony murmured. 

“It’s so good…” Clay replied hazily, his head tilted back and his eyes still closed. Goosebumps spread across his whole torso and up his arms as Tony feathered his lips along Clay’s exposed skin, his warm breath sending shivers that electrified Clay’s whole body. “God, Tony, it’s so good, what you’re doing… How did you learn to do this?” he asked in amazement, his eyes opening, and then he quickly shook his head, realizing the obvious answer. “No, never mind… Not important, just—just don’t stop…”

Tony stifled a smile against Clay’s abs and glanced up at his friend’s face. In a gently playful tone he prodded, “Oh, you don’t want me to stop?”

“Tony,” Clay replied, with a slight groan.

“Do you, or do you not want me to stop, Clay?” A hint of laughter coloured Tony’s voice, his hands still holding Clay’s hips but his head held a few inches away from Clay’s skin.

“I _don’t_ ,” Clay answered, impatiently. When Tony didn’t move, Clay sighed and repeated, “Tony I said _I don’t want you to stop_.”

Tony’s voice was dark and low when he said, “ _What_ don’t you want me to stop, Clay?” His thumbs pressed into Clay’s hip bones. Clay swallowed and looked down at him, suddenly feeling his nervousness, his inexperience, his uncertainty rise back up to fight against the urgency that was pushing him forward. He had never seen this look in Tony’s eyes before, never heard his voice so raw.

Clay said, a tremor running through his words as he swallowed his hesitation, “I don’t want you to stop doing what you’re doing.”  
  
“And what am I doing?” Tony asked, nearly in a whisper. “What am I doing to you?” As he spoke those words Tony tilted his face down so that his mouth was almost touching Clay’s hard-on through his jeans. Clay could feel Tony’s hot breath on him through the fabric, and his whole body went rigid with the effort of holding himself together.

“You’re driving me crazy,” Clay half-sighed, half-groaned, lifting his hands and pressing his palms to his temples, willing himself not to go over the edge. What if he ruined this whole thing by coming too quickly? He could feel how close he was, and it was taking everything he had to keep himself under control. 

His unanswered question— _How did you learn to do this?_ —intruded on his thoughts and suddenly he was achingly aware of his own complete inexperience next to Tony’s obvious expertise. Clay had been kissed on a grand total of two occasions, both of which had ended with the girl in tears, and neither of which had led to anything even remotely like this feeling in his body right now. He was entirely unprepared for this. _All those other guys that Tony must have been with_ … he thought. An image of Ryan Shaver standing in Clay’s place flashed through Clay’s mind and he flinched, tried to make it disappear. 

Suddenly in his mind’s eye he was picturing Ryan standing there next to them, watching, that smirk on his face as he took note of Clay’s total ineptitude. As he watched Clay come inside his jeans, as he watched Tony shaking his head in disgust, getting up and walking away. A surge of panic zipped up through Clay and he took a sudden step back away from Tony, putting some distance between that hot breath and the bulge in his jeans that was threatening to ruin him. He was shaking his head and his eyes were suddenly wide open and a little frantic.

“Whoa,” Tony said, gently, almost as if he were trying to calm a startled horse. He got to his feet, watching Clay carefully, the worry entering his features as he took in Clay’s panic-ridden expression. “Hey. Clay. What happened? I’m sorry… I thought…”

Clay was still shaking his head. Now it was because he could see the mental calculations Tony was making, but they were wrong, and Clay scrambled to try to backtrack. 

“No no no, Tony, no—I mean _yes_ , what I mean is—you thought right. You’re right, about what you thought, it’s, it’s not that, I…” Tony looked perplexed, but less worried, as he listened to Clay’s babble. He waited, patiently, to understand what Clay meant. Clay swallowed, wishing desperately that he had some better thing to say, something sexier, or at least something that wouldn’t make him sound like the dorky virgin that he was. He sighed, decided to bite the bullet, and gestured at his cock in vague frustration. “I’m worried that I’m gonna, y’know… too quickly. Like, _right now_ , if you do what you were just doing, again. And it’s embarrassing, and I wish that I were better at this stuff, but I’m not, and I’m such a fucking loser, and, just, now you know.”

Clay had his hands on his hips, shaking his head now at his own complete failure, feeling the frustration against himself rising up in his chest. He looked at the ground ahead of his feet and tried to survive the embarrassment burning him all over.   
  
“Clay,” Tony began, the gentle puzzlement in his voice drawing Clay’s eyes back up to look at him. “… Did it not occur to you that maybe I _want_ to make you come?” A shiver ran up Clay’s spine. “Like, maybe that’s what I’m _trying_ to do?” Tony’s eyes were so sweet, so gentle, with barely an edge of humour entering his expression.

Clay blinked. “Um,” he said. He swallowed. Tony took a step closer. He watched Clay’s face, and the humour disappeared from his voice.

“Do you have any idea how much I want to make you lose control, Clay?”

Clay gritted his teeth and sighed, half in pleasure and half in agony. Tony took another step, so that now he and Clay were almost touching—almost, but not quite. Clay’s whole body was trembling. Tony tilted his head ever so slightly, still without making any physical contact, so that his breath warmed the skin on Clay’s neck, just below his ear. 

“I want to know how you taste when you come,” Tony whispered, and Clay’s eyes were closed again, and it was all he could do to just simply nod. His lips were parted, and his breath was coming shakily. 

With his eyes closed Clay felt rather than saw his jeans being unzipped, the merciful release from the too-tight confines. And then he felt as Tony pulled his boxers down and the night air came into contact with his almost painfully hard erection. This was agony. It was too much. He was too far gone now to even feel self-conscious, all he felt was anticipation and a sharp, aching yearning. 

The feeling of Tony’s mouth on his cock was something that Clay could never have imagined or been prepared for. It was exquisite. It was pure fucking agonizing bliss, the softest, the wettest, warmest feeling Clay had ever experienced, electricity zinging up his entire being, and nothing else in the whole world except Tony’s mouth, holding him, _press_ ing, _mov_ ing, _fuck_ ing _per_ fect, fuck _—_ ing, 

_Fuck_

Like the whole world bursting out of itself. Explosions inside his skull, the power lines in his body downed by the storm and electrifying all the water. The convulsions rocked him forward, bending inward, a sound like gasping, or choking, escaping his throat, his eyes still shut. Tony did not pull away, was there with him through the whole shower of sparks and lava, the shivers that ran through Clay’s body, Tony’s mouth tasting, drinking, holding. When he gently released, with Clay still half-doubled over above him, Tony pressed his lips, again, to Clay’s hip bone, and then to his stomach, his chest, his neck. Once again standing, he wrapped his arms around Clay’s bare, sweating torso and held him. 

“You kill me, you’re so beautiful,” he murmured against Clay’s neck. “Jesus Christ, Clay. That was the most beautiful fucking thing.”

The deepest, warmest sense of safety filled Clay, his entire being held in the comfort of Tony’s embrace. It was the calmest and most relaxed he could ever remember feeling. It all seemed a little surreal, but Clay pushed that thought away, because it made it seem somehow less possible. He didn’t want to worry, yet, about how this was all happening, or about what was going to happen next. He breathed in Tony’s scent (which felt, at once, both familiar and somehow also entirely new to him), leaned into his best friend’s arms, and let his mind go quiet. Out past the two boys in the darkness, the waves continued with their gentle crashing. 


End file.
